return to table of content

Disney to take $1.5B stake in Epic Games

gamepsys
139 replies
19h9m

Disney gets more IP in front of more 13-25 year olds. This is a very impressionable age group, and can create life long fans. This is a good value proposition for Disney. Epic probably gets an increase in valuation -- lifeblood for tech companies.

Collaboration skins are massive for revenue. However, I'm concerned this relationship will force uncool collaborations with Fortnite and reduce it's appeal. Disney has had some flops recently. Long term the trick for Fortnite is to become the most sticky online videogame in history, with most games bleeding audience over time. Epic is more than just Fortnite, but I imagine this deal is entirely about Fortnite.

resolutebat
96 replies
19h1m

My kids already think many recent Fortnite collabs (Star Wars, Marvel, etc) are lame. Hasn't stopped them from playing though.

https://www.dexerto.com/fortnite/every-fortnite-collab-cross...

sublinear
93 replies
18h42m

I had the same reaction 20 years ago to Kingdom Hearts.

Disney is definitely at risk of becoming irrelevant with their stale IP.

tomcam
47 replies
16h51m

At risk? They haven’t had hit movie for years. They have destroyed just about everything they’ve touched, from Indiana Jones to Star Wars to Snow White.

michael_nielsen
15 replies
16h2m

I flagged this - it seems too clearly flame bait. If it was an honest mistake, my apologies. Disney had three movies in 2023 which took more than $200 million at the US box office

chrismcb
7 replies
15h36m

And how much did those movies cost to make? I think the movies you are referring to were expecting to make 500m or more. They needed to make about 500 to break even! Disney said have some successes last year. But they aren't as impressive as you might think

gen220
6 replies
15h7m

Box Office is not the yardstick disney uses, that's just the first phase of the disney wheel. They make oodles of money in merchandise and theme park content that's based on the same (expensive) IP as the movie. When they don't break even on the movie, they'll generally break even or make money on the IP behind the movie.

caseysoftware
3 replies
13h39m

Here's the problem with that analysis, how do you attribute revenue to a specific movie? Will people attend the theme parks or spend more at them because of [movie X]? It's the same problem you have with streaming. Will people subscribe or stay subscribed to D+ longer because of [movie X]?

Until you can answer one or both in a repeatable, predictable way, we can wave our hands and say "it makes money later!" or "it doesn't make money later!" and neither is provable.

One other aspect that we CAN prove: streaming kills DVD sales. That's a revenue stream that is gone and won't be coming back so we have yet another deficit to fill.

Until then, Box Office and merchandising are the ONLY numbers that we, analysts, and stockholders can point at where "You put in $X and got out $Y" for their movie business. And as of right now, that puts Disney's 2023 numbers deeply negative.

mschuster91
1 replies
7h17m

One other aspect that we CAN prove: streaming kills DVD sales. That's a revenue stream that is gone and won't be coming back so we have yet another deficit to fill.

Which is why Disney+ is its own streaming service. Keeps all the eggs in the same basket.

caseysoftware
0 replies
3h27m

So far, streaming hasn't made nearly the same amount as DVD sales and it's ridiculously expensive to run one.

That said, licensing to other streaming services often does work. You get revenue for the cost of a contract vs having the infrastructure costs and nebulous ROI. You get the added benefit of direct attribution because you can tell "we licensed [movie X] for $X for Y years".

gen220
0 replies
18m

To be clear, I totally agree with you. I think the success of theme parks and merchandise has been covering up mediocre IP from Disney for a while, and that fact is dangerous to their future prospects.

However, trying to balance this critique with some fairness to their strategy, it is difficult to disambiguate "the strategy isn't working" from "the strategy is helping us float across some mediocre years until we chance upon the next Frozen". It's kind of like VC returns, where it's 10 "%" of their IP (Star Wars, Mickey, Frozen, Toy Story, Marvel, etc.) that drive 90% of their performance. 2023 was definitely a poor "vintage" for Disney IP.

That being said, Disney has rebounded from many spells of mediocrity, and their theme parks, merchandise, and old IP (now monetized through Disney+ as you say) have kept them afloat through those poor periods.

Most recently they've only been able to jump-start the IP engines through acquisition (Pixar 2006, Marvel in 2009). I'm not a Disney shareholder myself, but I agree that the IP tap seems to be running dry and that's very concerning. I don't think Epic Games has anywhere near the value ceiling that Marvel and Pixar did.

jl6
1 replies
9h54m

That would traditionally be the case, but the merchandising is bombing too, and (anecdata time) I can confirm this through personal observation: 80%-off sales of Star Wars merchandise in a local toy store, and my kids and their circle having a keen sense of which IP they like (unsurprising spoiler: it’s the stuff based on good movies, not the stuff based on bad movies).

bombcar
0 replies
5h40m

I think the surest example of this is the Lego Star Wars toys more and more being obviously adult-targeted.

Not everything can be Frozen, but the pallet of Wish merchandise at Walmart is still there and now all marked down (except the Lego because they know that someone will buy it eventually for parts).

Elemental merchandising was completely non-existent and that was a mistake, people enjoyed that.

tomcam
4 replies
14h25m

They were all flops. They cost massively more to film and to market than that. And remember theater owners get half of the gross.

lukan
3 replies
10h0m

As much as I despised for example the first new Star Wars, The Force Awakens:

"The film grossed $2.07 billion worldwide, breaking various box office records and becoming the highest-grossing film in the United States and Canada, the highest-grossing film of 2015, and the third-highest-grossing film at the time of its release"

suddenclarity
2 replies
7h17m

People forget that the movie came out nine years ago and shouldn't pass for "recent years", which the discussion above is about. The movie also primarily sold through hype to kids who grew up with the prequels, which had little to do with the quality. People, including me, still lived in denial back then. It wasn't until the second movie that my friends realized how terrible Star Wars had become and promised to never watch a Disney movie at the cinema again. A reputation Disney seems to have embraced considering the countless discussions of their decline.

lukan
1 replies
6h45m

Well, part 2:

"It grossed over $1.3 billion worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film of 2017"

and part 3:

"grossed over $1.077 billion worldwide, making it the seventh-highest-grossing film of 2019 "

Cannot really be called flops either. And the Mandalorian is highly succesful as well. And probably some other movies, I don't know, I do not follow. My point is, that I share the criticism of how bad Star Wars became under Disney, I dropped out, after they seriously introduced yet another death star. But commercially they were highly succesful.

bombcar
0 replies
5h45m

They were flops even if they made money because their expectations were so infinitely sky-high.

Force Awakens? Everyone who had ever seen Star Wars went to see it (extended family had a tradition of seeing Star Wars movies when they came out). Later ones didn’t have that, and we’ve never seen the last one.

Elemental obviously outperformed expectations but was no Toy Story. Wish is not doing well and looks unlikely to recover.

We’re long gone from the era of every single Disney (or Pixar) animated film being an absolute instant classic and powerhouse.

(Part of this may be the huge number of live action remakes - even if financially successful they seem entirely forgettable).

paganel
1 replies
9h43m

Star Wars is destroyed beyond redemption by now, and the same goes for Indiana Jones. Pixar is also on a downwards trajectory, and whoever says otherwise is deluding himself/herself.

bombcar
0 replies
5h43m

Pixar is just a movie studio now, churning out basic animated movies. They’re no longer head-and-shoulders above everyone, and other studios are certainly competitive or even outclassing.

Turning Red and Teenage Kraken have a superficially similar plot and the Pixar one is much “better made” in many ways, but neither is earth-shattering.

Benjamin_Dobell
12 replies
16h0m

Frozen is one of the newest entries out of any media franchise to gross more than $10B — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_media.... More than Fortnite has grossed. Not too shabby.

chrismcb
5 replies
15h40m

Frozen came out ten years ago and frozen 2 came out five years ago. I think that qualifies as a few years. Granted life has been tough on the movies since some odd event in 2020

nirvdrum
2 replies
14h37m

If you take "for years" to literally mean "more than one year", sure. I think it's colloquially understood to be far longer than that. "Encanto" came out in 2021 and I'd consider that a hit. The soundtrack saw wide play, everyone I know who's seen it loves it, and they're merchandising the hell out of it.

To be fair, I saw "Wish" with my family and we all enjoyed it, but it obviously didn't come close to "Frozen 2" numbers. They're not all hits. With animated film taking years to produce, those perhaps aren't the metric to use. It'll be another few years before the next major animated film by Disney is released.

The Marvel movies release more frequently and seem to print money. "Guardians of the Galaxy: Volume 3" came out last year and has done $845MM¹.

¹ -- https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl2977202945/

bombcar
1 replies
5h50m

Encanto was fun but it didn’t merchandise the way Frozen did (nothing before or after has, to be fair).

Keep an eye on the clearance aisles for a feel on how merchandising is going; wish is doing exceptionally bad.

nirvdrum
0 replies
3h52m

I guess I don't know what we mean by "hit" then. I tried to address it from cultural impact, box office earnings, and movie quality. On any one of those criteria I don't think it's been that long since Disney has had a hit. If a film needs to push "Frozen" numbers to be a hit, then I'll concede they haven't had one in years.

Benjamin_Dobell
1 replies
15h29m

It's relative. No-one else has produced a media franchise that earns as much or more than Disney any more recently.

Disney has also produced some of the most recent highest grossing box office films https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_films. Again, this is relative. We've just had a pandemic followed by writers and actors guild strikes.

bombcar
0 replies
5h51m

Minions is damn close, however. Freaking billion dollar movies and infinite numbers of the yellow dudes everywhere.

yellowapple
1 replies
14h13m

I didn't know Pokémon is the single highest-grossing franchise. That's wild and kinda unexpected given its age relative to Mickey Mouse & Friends in 2nd.

godzillabrennus
0 replies
5h38m

Wait till you see what the original gameboy games sell for these days. If they are sealed you can buy a car for less.

namdnay
0 replies
6h38m

a bit off topic, but the global cultural impact of Frozen on kindergarten girls is absolutely insane. we all have memories of whatever the trend was when were a specific age, but nearly every 3-6 year old girl on the planet knows everything there is to know about the Frozen universe and had managed to get hold of some piece of merchandise (even if it's only a hair clip). And it's been like that for the past 8 years!

jtuple
0 replies
15h24m

Fortnite generated $5.5B in 2023 alone and is estimated at over $20B in lifetime revenue

jasomill
0 replies
15h35m

According to that page, Frozen merchandise alone has grossed nearly as much in ten years as the entire Star Trek franchise in almost sixty.

Presumably not adjusted for inflation, but still impressive.

herbst
0 replies
9h56m

I was surprised to see how much they spend for their movies. We talk about billion dollars and more they put into a single movie.

nilamo
4 replies
16h14m

They've had several hits over the past few years, what nonsense are you spreading? Encanto and Turning Red are both great

herbst
3 replies
9h55m

When a company is spending more to make a movie than they earn with the movie it's no success just a lot of bought buzz

nilamo
2 replies
7h15m

Encanto: $150m budget vs $250m box office.

So again, "no hit movies" is easily disproven with 10s of time to look into it.

Khaine
1 replies
6h15m

A movie needs to bring in twice its budget to be profitable[1] is the common rule of thumb. The budget doesn't include things like marketing, and the fact that the box office is shared with the theatre owner.

So in your example, it potentially lost money for Disney. The wikipedia article almost says as much [2]

"Although it underperformed at the box office ..."

[1] https://gizmodo.com/how-much-money-does-a-movie-need-to-make...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encanto

bombcar
0 replies
5h31m

Was Encanto the one they dumped on Disney+ real quick? It might have strongly affected popularity of the song (which is catchy as all hell, and can stand with Let It Go) since that was perhaps the peak.

None of the recent Disney animated movies have been “direct to DVD” terrible but they haven’t been exceptionally better than everything else.

It used to be that everyone basically considered Disney (and upstart Pixar) to be at the top of the class, and even extremely successful movies like Despicable Me to be a tier or two below.

sota4077
3 replies
16h1m

Well this is just straight up false. Moana was a massive success. Frozen is a monstrous success for them. Star Wars not being a success is objectively false. The Force Awakens is the second best selling Star Wars movie of all time.

chrismcb
2 replies
15h38m

Moana came out almost 8 years ago! The force awakens is even older. I think you are proving the OPs point.

LarsDu88
1 replies
12h25m

And they're making a live action one baby!

bombcar
0 replies
5h36m

Live action remakes are the new “safe sequel”.

I think they should be compared to how well a literal rerelease of the original would do.

I think part of the evidence is just how absolutely long lived Frozen 1 has been. Nothing has been able to even come close to unseating that, not even its sequel (they were very smart to keep everything similar enough so that Frozen 2 merchandise can substitute for Frozen 1 in a kid’s eye).

It’s very indicative that people jump to movies that have been out for a decade or more, and probably can’t even name most of the more recent releases.

paulddraper
2 replies
16h22m

By what metric was Star Wars not a hit movie

bombcar
1 replies
5h39m

By comparison to the previous two trilogies, and by performance of offshoots resulting in cancellations.

It was supposed to kick off a Marvell-style universe of infinite blockbusters. It didn’t.

airstrike
0 replies
5h27m

That's not the definition of a flop though

gamblor956
1 replies
13h56m

Avatar 2 came out just over a year ago is one of the highest grossing movies of all time.

bombcar
0 replies
5h35m

Both avatar movies are somehow insanely high grossing and apparently nobody remembers them at all. It’s a skill set to be sure.

yellowapple
0 replies
14h16m

They haven’t had hit movie for years.

If I had a nickel for every time I've heard someone singing that one song from Encanto I'd be able to buy Disney.

wnevets
0 replies
16h7m

They haven’t had hit movie for years.

are we really gonna make up things that are easily disprovable?

jjulius
0 replies
16h35m

And yet they're still incredibly relevant...

ahuhz
0 replies
58m

Hit movies don’t really seem to matter to Disney in the grand scheme of things. It’s more about selling merchandise of their already established brands.

giancarlostoro
17 replies
18h23m

If instead of buying IP and stealing from public domain works they invested more into creating new IP they could actually make a lot of money.

I'm sick of them being allowed to increase their entertainment monopoly on children instead of being told to just create new original works. It's not like they have a shortage of talented people...

Yodel0914
8 replies
17h30m

It is not possible to steal from the public domain. That's the entire point of it.

tanseydavid
3 replies
16h44m

Go try to produce something based around the public domain story Cinderella.

I doubt that Disney would take this kindly or lightly.

That's the entire point of the post that you are responding to.

bombcar
0 replies
5h29m

There’s a French live action Beauty and the Beast which was rereleased in the US to take advantage of the hype around Disney’s remake - and it’s actually darn good for a $5 supermarket checkout movie.

Disney sued nobody.

blackoil
0 replies
16h32m
bazoom42
0 replies
5h39m

You mean like Andrew Lloyd Webbers musical Bad Cinderella?

kmeisthax
2 replies
14h36m

It's stealing in the cultural appropriation sense, not the copyright sense.

When you create a new work based off a public domain work, you own what you added to that work. If your adaptation happens to be extremely successful, that effectively recopyrights the character, because the version people care about is the one you own. If someone else wants to use the public domain character, they have to aggressively distance their use of that character from yours.

Disney spent decades re-imagining Europe's folk tales[0] through his lens. Their movies are the ones people think about when you mention Snow White, Cinderella, Pinocchio, etc. Notably, the visual designs are unique enough to get independent copyright protection. So independent uses of those characters don't look like themselves.

This, BTW, is why anyone who wants to renounce copyright over their creative work should opt for CC-BY-SA and not a public domain dedication. Share-alike clauses prevent this sort of gradual appropriation.

[0] as filtered/censored thru the Brothers Grimm

bazoom42
0 replies
10h20m

The material which was public domain is still public domain, Disney did not “re-copyright” anything. Just google how many different versions of Pinocchio has been made independently from Disney. Gulliermo del Toro won an oscar for his version. If you havent seen that it is your own fault, not the fault of Disney or copyright law.

Stephen Sondheim had a pretty succesful musical based on Grimms tales.

But yeah, if you want people to care about your version, you have to bring something new to the table.

Yodel0914
0 replies
13h1m

It's stealing in the cultural appropriation sense, not the copyright sense.

Well, I agree with that. But very likely not for the same reasons you do.

GartzenDeHaes
0 replies
5h41m

Getting their cronies in congress to extend copyright protections from 14 years to 100 years is stealing from the public domain.

mynameisvlad
6 replies
18h20m

What public domain works have their recent movies been based off of?

Outside of their reimaginings/reboots, I can't think of a single recent movie that isn't an original work.

And that doesn't include things like LucasFilm, Marvel and Pixar which are, obviously, original and still part of Disney.

legostormtroopr
5 replies
18h4m

Tangled (Repunzel), Moana (uses and remixes actual Polynesian myths), Frozen (based on the snow queen), Peter Pan, Little Mermaid - a stack of recent Disney movies have been based on existing IP. You just don't notice because they culturally steamroll the originals.

The most recent movie Wish - is just callbacks to other Disney movies, so does it count as original IP?

And this excludes their reboots - but also excludes Pixar which has done some original albeit lacklustre stuff recently.

mynameisvlad
2 replies
17h39m

Peter Pan is a 70-year old movie. Little Mermaid is 25 years old.

There have also been many, many original movies released in that time: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Walt_Disney_Pictures...

The vast majority of recent Disney content is original.

thaumasiotes
1 replies
15h18m

Little Mermaid is 25 years old.

You're thinking of Mulan, not The Little Mermaid.

mynameisvlad
0 replies
12h54m

Oh god I misread 89 as 99. Even I didn’t realize it was that old.

selimthegrim
1 replies
17h50m

As far as Frozen goes, at least they got something new to replace the Norway exhibit at Epcot, because it got so old and stale, that Norway disowned it, and refused to pay for the renewal

bombcar
0 replies
5h27m

Frozen is just Norwegian propaganda and you’ll not convince me otherwise.

I wonder if anyone has worked out the actual dollar effect it is has had on Norwegian tourism.

s1artibartfast
0 replies
17h57m

IMO, their biggest problem is moving away from public domain works.

totetsu
14 replies
18h20m

When kingdom hearts was released I got my first glimpse of how some people seem to throw their logic and taste out the window for Disney. It just seemed the dumbest thing to me. And why was the sword a key.. [edit: this was my teenage selfs opinion]

ethbr1
8 replies
18h9m

Some people like goofy mashup fun.

There's a ton of people who apparently really liked Kingdom Hearts.

It's pretty elitist to consider some IP too sacred to remix.

tombert
3 replies
17h57m

I only played Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 on the Playstation 2 as a teenager, and I did enjoy them while playing, but I have to admit that I have absolutely no idea what the hell happened story-wise by the end of the second game. The story just got increasingly convoluted and harder to follow, and the juxtaposition of serious Final Fantasy characters and Disney characters never really stopped being funny to me.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF
1 replies
15h44m

100% agreed on the story. There’s a recap video that’s probably not too hard to find on youtube which takes 30 minutes to explain the story up to the start of KH3 and I remember a predictable amount of it. There’s also this gem: https://youtube.com/watch?v=fCWjSOSWiUw

I only know enough about what “Aqua got ‘Norted” means to put an apostrophe in front of ‘Norted. (Xehanort possesses people or whatever.) I also literally never saw Aqua in any game I played before KH3, except maybe as an extra I didn’t notice.

WorldMaker
0 replies
2h3m

Somewhere in the middle between the serious recap and the short joke remains this incredible video essay trying to explain the series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwEwxKkCGJE

aidenn0
0 replies
17h36m

I didn't play KH for the story; it was just a fun ARPG. I couldn't tell you the plot to the Mana games either, and they had some ridiculous stuff too (traveling by cannon?)

jvanderbot
0 replies
17h59m

Everyone in my friend group considered it a runaway hit. They all played a ton.

I was amazed.

justech
0 replies
17h23m

goofy mashup fun

Heh, not sure if pun intended but this made me giggle

hoseja
0 replies
10h8m

Does it feature Jesus of Nazareth?

HideousKojima
0 replies
17h57m

The first KH was fun I guess. And the combat mechanics Square made for KH are now the standard in Final Fantasy. But the story of KH went completely off the rails in all the sequels and spinoffs and I don't understand how anyone still cares about the story anymore.

n6242
0 replies
17h59m

To me at least, I liked Kingdom Hearts as a kid despite the Disney stuff, not thanks to it. I played it after Final Fantasy IX and X so I really enjoyed the change from turn-based combat.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
17h39m

And why was the sword a key.

surprisingly one of the simpler questions to answer. The Keyblade is the key that can open (or close) any door. And that was the theme of the first Kingdom Hearts: doors. the big villians plan is to destroy all worlds by opening the door to the Dark World and flooding the existing Light dimension with hoards of monsters. you also spend a lot of time closing off the doors to the heart of the world to protect their cores (monsters destroy core = destroyed world).

In addition to bashing enemies and being a large narrative hook, it's a nifty explanation for why you are able to simply tap on a chest and open anything you want. Or break and enter into a bunch of buildings (although the game forgets constantly that it can do that).

birracerveza
0 replies
10h34m

KH is a beautiful mess that makes absolutely no sense at all, from the idea to the execution, a complete fever dream that is somehow a very enjoyable experience, but only if you embrace the silliness of it all.

If you're a teenager that may be much easier... or much harder, in cases such as yours.

SllX
0 replies
17h54m

Because it was a really fun action RPG with camera control issues, that then got fixed in Kingdom Hearts II (actually sooner with Final Mix Plus I think but most people weren’t importing that). It started life as a collab, and it took on an identity of its own almost from your first moment in the game. I literally don’t have a conception of what Donald or Goofy are like outside of Kingdom Hearts anymore, well except for Donald’s contribution to the Ducking Hardcore Mix of It’s a Small World.

IP don’t make the game. The game makes the game.

SilasX
0 replies
15h28m

Cynical answer: a big key is less scary to the soccer moms buying this stuff for their kids (than a sword).

kmeisthax
4 replies
14h52m

The thing about Kingdom Hearts is you assume it's a vapid Disney corporate tie-in, but then you play it and realize it's actually a vapid Square Enix corporate tie-in. That's the actual draw for Kingdom Hearts fans: an absolutely incomprehensible mess of a plot[0] that just so happens to use a shitton of Disney and Final Fantasy characters.

[0] "Simple and clean is the way it should be..."

teeray
1 replies
14h30m

Never got to play it, but I always loved “Simple and Clean.” Sounds like I got the best experience of the game.

geraldwhen
0 replies
7h49m

More or less yes. 1+2 are decent, but Simple and Clean is more powerful than either game combined.

dark-star
0 replies
7h57m

the lyrics you quoted are actually: "Simple and clean is the way that you′re making me feel tonight."

NetOpWibby
0 replies
14h35m

Tying in the lyrics was an excellent touch

duxup
3 replies
16h14m

I was a bit mystified by the appeal of kingdom of hearts too… but the fans I knew loved it so they must have done something right.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF
2 replies
15h59m

I’m not a disney fan but I enjoyed those games. They’re just good action RPGs with fresh advancement bonuses. Very Square Enix, which makes sense, of course.

KH3 also made me realize that they can start to target child and adult fans via recently popular titles (e.g. Frozen) and ~30 years ago popular titles (e.g. Toy Story), respectively.

StevenXC
1 replies
14h41m

Frozen (2013), i.e. 11 years ago

k12sosse
0 replies
5h55m

Let it go.

mckn1ght
1 replies
10h35m

Same reaction here with Magic: the Gathering, and all their collabs (Marvel is on the horizon-ugh) but still enjoy playing the game. And they’re apparently single-handedly keeping Hasbro afloat.

Funny enough Disney also recently launched their own TCG: Lorcana. A whole new way to leverage that IP!

slater-
0 replies
8h42m

I’m gonna make a deck that’s just Mountains and Spider-Mans

amiantos
0 replies
27m

Disney is at risk of becoming irrelevant? And people are upvoting this take?

As if all the Disney Adults in the world are just going to snap out of it. As if all the children who love Disney stuff currently are going to grow out of it. In what world is this considered an informative and knowledgable take?

Even at its lowest point financially, Disney IP has never been irrelevant at any point.

TomK32
1 replies
10h54m

Just wait until Disney buys Hasbro and watch how bad Magic the Gathering will get then...

mckn1ght
0 replies
10h34m

Haha you beat me to the punch a little bit here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39299416

But they have a competing product… for now?

hmcdona1
16 replies
18h55m

No, Disney uses Unreal for their rendered real-time sets. This is about more than just Fortnite.

jsheard
8 replies
18h52m

Do they still? They used Unreal for the virtual sets in The Mandalorian S1, but for S2 they switched over to a different solution.

https://www.ilm.com/vfx/the-mandalorian/

For season one of the series ILM StageCraft utilized Unreal Engine to perform the real-time render

https://www.ilm.com/vfx/the-mandalorian-season-2/

The real-time render engine called Helios was specifically developed by ILM engineers

Ctrl-F "Unreal" - no results
reactordev
5 replies
18h47m

StageCraft IS Unreal Engine.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/StageCraft

ILM used Unreal Engine to make StageCraft and kept iterating on it until it’s the awesome tech that it is. They have a vested interest in seeing the underlying engine continue to prosper.

katabatic
3 replies
18h27m

StageCraft WAS Unreal Engine; it is not anymore.

westurner
2 replies
17h47m

StageCraft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StageCraft

What is Helios?

/? Helios StageCraft https://rebusfarm.net/news/ilm-stagecraft-a-virtual-producti... :

StageCraft leverages Helios ILM’s real-time cinema render engine. It is a set of LED screens that work as a 360 extension digital set, allowing filmmakers to explore new ideas, communicate concepts, and execute shots in a collaborative and flexible production environment.

Is there a way to vary the [UE] AutoLOD for longer shots? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38160089

That's not even cinematography! Because there aren't lenses, there are presumably Camera matrices.

Cinematography: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematography

Computer graphics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_graphics

"Ask HN: What's the state of the art for drawing math diagrams online?" (2023) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38355444 ; generative-manim, manimGPT, BlenderGPT, ipyblender, o3de, how do we teach primary math intuition with the platforms that reach them, how do we Manim in 3 or even 4D?

Manim > "Render with [Blender and/or od3e]" https://github.com/ManimCommunity/manim/issues/3362

FWIU Disney Games are often built with Panda3d, which works with pygame-web/pygbag in WASM now

Research: "Fabric of the Cosmos", "Cosmos", "How the Universe Works",

westurner
0 replies
3h57m

Apply [StageCraft (UE5),] computer graphics to STEM education.

A HUD-like [spinning ball trajectory] with observations and symbolic model fitting

Hopefully they will invest in Games that cause STEM (and SEL) learning;

And hopefully they will apply great CGI tools for STEM education

westurner
0 replies
3h51m

Is there a way to vary the [UE] AutoLOD for longer shots?

UE5 (and other 4d graphics and physics simulators) automatically reduce the LOD Level-of-Detail for objects in the distance.

Is that LOD parametric with StageCraft software?

(For example, reportedly Cities Skyline 2 is bad slow because they included meshes for characters' teeth and expected AutoLOD to just make it work on the computers kids tend to have. It doesn't work on reasonable machines because the devs all have fast pro GPUs to develop on, so they don't know what the UX is for the average family (that would be happy to turn down the polygon count themselves for what we can learn from the gameplay). Having game devs dogfood with real-world devices that families afford would be good for these firms too.).

Hopefully they'll continue to sell games through non-Epic stores that people have already invested in.

And hopefully, they'll make sure their products work with Proton and thus popular Linux-based handheld gaming devices.

jsheard
0 replies
18h43m

They made a point of highlighting the use of Unreal during the production of Season 1, but then it's completely absent from their discussion of later seasons, instead only referencing an in-house renderer they call Helios. Have they specifically said anywhere that they're still using Unreal Engine?

https://www.ilm.com/industrial-light-magic-to-expand-stagecr...

This 2021 article mentions that external productions using StageCraft services can choose to use either Unreal or Helios for rendering, so the Unreal integration may still be available for those who want it, but obviously ILM didn't write a brand new renderer for the fun of it. Unreal must not have been cutting it for their own productions.

highwaylights
0 replies
18h22m

I believe the new version is called StageCraft: Brood War.

Thank you.

esskay
0 replies
9h36m

I've got a family member that works on production at Lucas, Unreal is still very much a mainstay and not going anywhere.

They're actually expanding their use of it with more virtual sets, mainly because they're now leasing them out a fair bit and need the capacity.

reactordev
3 replies
18h51m

This. Virtual Set Production is almost entirely Unreal engine. Fortnite is just a marketing platform. The real meat is the digital production pipeline that made Mando cool. That enabled Star Trek’s recent series’, and provides a “holodeck” for their just unveiled holo-floor.

jrockway
2 replies
18h49m

I don't think Fortnite is just a marketing platform. They wouldn't have bothered suing Apple and Google over app stores if it were merely a loss leader to remind film execs that Unreal Engine is a thing.

callalex
0 replies
18h21m

While I agree with you that Fortnite shouldn’t be considered a loss leader, the strategy behind challenging Apple in court is more nuanced. Epic also operates a rather large software/games store and I am sure they would love to see it grow.

Hikikomori
0 replies
17h31m

I mean they have epic games store that competes with steam on windows. They likely want to be able to the same thing on phones.

vineyardmike
0 replies
18h50m

Epic has purchased VFX companies in the past, and Unity was eying that market before they imploded recently, making a bunch of acquisitions.

It’s an obvious and huge opportunity for game engine experts to grow their influence.

mogoh
0 replies
18h49m

That would be less expensive.

codexb
0 replies
18h20m
ydg6
14 replies
17h0m

Disney is the last standing Old Media company.

All other Media and Entertainment companies are either owned by Comcast/AT&T or are Tech companies (netflix, amazon,apple,sony,youtube,tiktokk) that have carved out a chunk of the media and entertainment sector.

Disney is basically on the back foot here, at a time when the attention economy is wrecking chaotic unpredictable havoc on the the media sector.They had to do something cause shareholder revolt has been brewing for a while.

Staple_Diet
10 replies
16h28m

Really? I thought Disney was doing well. Their subscription service is only behind Netflix and Amazon, the latter of which includes its service in Prime so is not an equal competitor. Further, their ownership of Marvel has provided them some of the largest grossing films of all time, and their Star Wars acquisition seems to be paying off. The parks seem to be quite strong, but I've only experienced the Japan ones. Overall I find it difficult, from a layman's perspective, to believe Disney is in trouble but welcome any other information.

lotsofpulp
6 replies
15h1m

See their net income and profit margin trends:

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/DIS/disney/net-inc...

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/DIS/disney/profit-...

Doesn’t look so hot for the last 4 or 5 years. They went from earning near $10B per year to less than $3B per year.

Rexxar
4 replies
14h11m

If you ignore the Covid drop, the trend change seems to start in 2019 when they bought Century Fox.

lotsofpulp
3 replies
13h47m

I’m not sure what the exact cause is, but for some reason, they lose billions on streaming (page 24):

https://thewaltdisneycompany.com/app/uploads/2023/11/Q4_FY23...

bombcar
1 replies
5h22m

How much of this is real losses and how much is accounting tricks by licensing content from themselves?

lotsofpulp
0 replies
4h55m

I would guess none based on the breakdown on page 10. They would have written in the “Direct to consumer” section that licensing costs were the reason for the losses. Instead, they specified that technology costs and costs to create the media were the tradings for the losses.

nonethewiser
0 replies
10h20m

Because they give lots of subscriptions away for free and the paying customers are paying a subsidized price.

All so Disney can increase market share. This is why you cant just point to subscriber count as a success indicator.

Staple_Diet
0 replies
11h39m

Thanks, this definitely adds some context. Seems all these acquisitions is costly work.

sofixa
1 replies
9h34m

Their subscription service is only behind Netflix and Amazon

Because it's drastically cheaper in an obvious dumping exercise, and has some interesting IP kids and grown ups that used to be kids want to (re)watch. However there really isn't that much content on it, nor is new content coming that quickly, so at some point after everything of interest has been seen, people will start unsubscribing.

This is why Netflix is constantly churning out new stuff of very varying quality (utter shit next to masterpieces) - you need to keep people paying the subscription.

bombcar
0 replies
5h20m

This is the root issue with these - people subscribe to Disney+ et al because it has everything (Ariel voice) and then they get bored having watched it all, the kids are satisfied by a single dvd on repeat, so you let the subscription lapse.

I had D+, Prime, and Netflix at one point and now have none.

The DVDs at the library are free, too.

patmorgan23
0 replies
26m

They've had several big box office fails, partially because the Disney+ has been cannibalizing those viewers (why go see it in theaters when I can wait three months and watch it on Disney+ for no additional cost?).

Also they've over saturated the MCU with a million movies and TV shows every year. People have just been burned out on it and they've only recently decided to cut back production on those and be more focused.

lotsofpulp
1 replies
16h40m

ATT sold its media business to Discovery, which is now Warner Bros Discovery, which is old media.

Also, there is still Paramount.

Sony Pictures started in 1987, so that should qualify as old media too.

And there is also Lionsgate.

Disney is by far the biggest and most relevant, though.

WorldMaker
0 replies
1h45m

Given how much the Discovery arm seems to be in control, Warner Bros Discovery may be "new media" in old media clothing.

Skydance is trying to buy National Amusements to take over Paramount and arguably be a similar new media in old media clothing if that deal goes through.

Sony Pictures started in 1987, so that should qualify as old media too.

I know objective that's almost 40 years ago and probably does qualify for old, but that still seems too recent in Hollywood Empires. But Sony Pictures also has the advantage it bought truly old media Columbia/TriStar and didn't seem to kill them and kind of left them to continue to do their thing, so maybe Sony gets more of a pass too.

And there is also Lionsgate.

Lionsgate was formed in 1997.

Maybe you are thinking about MGM (and its famous Lion logo), which Amazon has been trying not to kill since it acquired that ancient studio brand, but also is very much appearing to be Amazon still being Amazon just wearing that brand (which was on life support or already a zombie when purchased) like a skin at this point?

KptMarchewa
0 replies
9h34m

Paramount?

citizenpaul
8 replies
17h3m

Id say fortnight has quite the ways to go then. Counterstrike and World of Warcraft have 15-20 years headstart and are still going.

gamepsys
5 replies
14h6m

I was actually thinking about World of Warcraft when I was thinking about a game that failed to be sticky. World of Warcraft peaked in subscriber count in 2010, and has generally seen steady decline since then. I think the numbers for WoW look worse when you consider how sharply it's share of the video game market has declined. The video game market has ballooned in size while Wow's user base is slowly bleeding out.

It's hard to get accurate data, but Fortnite has roughly 100x more users than World of Warcraft. Counterstrike is an even smaller userbase.

bombcar
1 replies
5h18m

World of Warcraft is no failure by any measure, but it’s not the world-defining explosion it once was.

Existing players keep playing but you rarely hear of new players; at best they may convince old subscribers to return.

Minecraft is also old but seems to be collecting new players decently well.

gamepsys
0 replies
20m

This isn't about WoW, this is about Disney & Epic. If Fortnite fails to be stickier than WoW then this investment will be pretty bad.

World of Warcraft is probably the stickiest game in history. I can also see how an investment in Blizzard in the year 2010 might have been overly optimistic about WoW's future.

spookie
0 replies
8h43m

How is Counter Strike small? It has consistently 1.5 million daily players. It's about the same as Fortnite.

meheleventyone
0 replies
11h24m

A game that has lasted twenty years as a commercial project has definitely not failed to be sticky!

There’s a lot of hope and desire for “forever games” particularly from investors but there is no such thing. They will all have a peak and a steady decline at some stage. Social networks exhibit this pattern as well.

Reason077
0 replies
10h42m

”World of Warcraft peaked in subscriber count in 2010, and has generally seen steady decline since then.”

Sure, but even in 2024 this 20-year old game has a paid monthly player count well into the millions. Extremely successful by any measure. And perhaps one of the most profitable game franchises of all time.

Shrezzing
1 replies
8h59m

On longevity+userbase I think Minecraft and Roblox might have both beat. Both are 15+ years old, with enormous userbases, crucially their userbases include huge numbers of kids.

WoW and Counterstrike have large loyal fanbases, but I'd be surprised if the age of the average user didn't increase by around 1 year per year.

bombcar
0 replies
5h16m

Exactly - a very successful business can be had serving an existing group of customers for life, but eventually it will die out if new blood isn’t entering. Perhaps the only new kids playing WoW are literally children of people who met in the game …

itsoktocry
0 replies
6h4m

Disney gets more IP in front of more 13-25 year olds. This is a very impressionable age group, and can create life long fans. This is a good value proposition for Disney.

Perhaps.

Perhaps, also, it's the old media playbook interpreting what young people want as "jam advertisements in front of them".

Long term the trick for Fortnite is to become the most sticky online videogame in history

They might achieve this (certainly World of Warcraft holds the title). But I think video games are inherently faddish.

If I had to go one way or the other, I'd bet this is a bit of a desperate move by Disney who are becoming less relevant and whose cash cow (Marvel) is withering.

vineyardmike
37 replies
19h51m

Epic games has the potential to be the virtual Disney World - just available to everyone on the planet instead of those with enough money to visit a park IRL. Disney has a great flywheel where their IP drives content, toys, and experiences. This is just the latest experience, and it’s something they can’t build themselves.

I bet you can expect more content on fortnite to be with Disney IP; skins, events, maps, everything. It’ll be a great way to promote new movies/TV shows with cross-platform events. Fortnite has already had great luck with this sort of thing, so it makes sense for Disney to want access to it. Maybe you’ll even see IRL Fortnite experiences in theme parks or a Fortnite IP based movie or TV show.

dorkwood
12 replies
17h48m

I see huge potential for NFT integration as well. Imagine buying a Mickey Mouse skin in Fortnight and being able to use it in one of Epic Games' other games too. Lots of possibilities.

c0pium
3 replies
17h28m

Oh man, remember NFTs? Glad that’s over.

Zpalmtree
2 replies
17h15m

NFTs are doing just fine

guappa
0 replies
8h35m

As in "existing" sure, as in "having any value" not really.

2024throwaway
0 replies
9h52m

[Citation needed]

imtringued
1 replies
10h39m

Nobody cares. The NFT thing never made sense as anything but a receipt.

bombcar
0 replies
5h14m

I have a receipt from Walmart for an Xbox game, that will let it play on a PlayStation, right?

;)

ta_1138
0 replies
15h1m

Disney had a group looking at NFT and metaverse initiatives, but as far as I have seen, they all got canned in last year's layoffs. manager and everything. The company is huge, so it's not impossible that other group like that might remain employed there, somewhere, but at the very least the interest have waned.

rsynnott
0 replies
6h18m

Time travel confirmed; this person has clearly just arrived from 2021.

meheleventyone
0 replies
11h19m

You can already do this in Fortnite and Roblox, and half a dozen other gaming platforms no NFTs required.

kevinmchugh
0 replies
3h58m

This is basically just fortnite. When they wanted to make a racing game, they did it in fortnite. When they wanted a rhythm game, they did it in fortnite. Fortnite is a game browser and engine, not a set of mechanics.

Also if the intention is to limit the use of the property to epic games, why not use a plain old database? Nft seems like overkill

blackoil
0 replies
16h21m

use it in one of Epic Games' other games too.

That neither needs nor is easier with NFTs.

atomicUpdate
0 replies
17h28m

No one thinks NFTs have a future anywhere anymore, least of which in gaming. Nothing you described needs NFTs or crypto in any way either.

bakugo
9 replies
18h48m

Epic games has the potential to be the virtual Disney World

This is what everyone said about Lego, and a bunch of other collabs that came before. It was never true and it's not true now. Turns out people don't want a "virtual world", they want a fun game.

rasz
2 replies
14h3m

lego, as in Minecraft? Roblox? nobody wants that.

hhh
0 replies
11h5m

No, Lego as in Lego, Fortnite has a game mode that is a Lego survival game a la Valheim.

bonestamp2
0 replies
11h13m

Just for context, there are ~26,000 people signed in to the LEGO version of Fortnite right now, and it's 11pm Pacific/2am Eastern (there are ~179,000 people on the standard Fortnite). At primetime, there are typically 100,000+ people on the LEGO Fortnite.

maxsilver
2 replies
14h16m

Turns out people don't want a "virtual world", they want a fun game.

Arguably, there are people who want a "virtual world" -- and they currently just play Roblox to get it. Enough of them like it, that every major retailer stocks "Robux" gift cards

nitwit005
1 replies
13h26m

Sort of. Roblox resembles a game collection. Fortnite is increasingly similar.

subtra3t
0 replies
7h57m

Roblox is a lot more than just a game collection. The social aspect is a massive part of what made (keeps?) Roblox popular.

vineyardmike
1 replies
18h40m

A bunch of the collabs have been super successful. They don’t need to build a permanent Second Life type metaverse BS. Look at their concerts in Fortnite’s universe. Very successful at attracting eyes and money.

“Virtual Disney world” doesn’t mean VR roller coasters, it means Disney themed digital experiences (eg fun games). Disney and Epic have a decent track record building fun and profitable experiences for people.

chaostheory
0 replies
17h2m

To be fair, you did mention replicating the “Disney park experience IRL”, so yes it does mean VR Disney rides since that’s the closest that you’ll get to that experience. A flat screen is not going to come close to it.

romusha
0 replies
16h7m

Turns out people never ask about metaverse, and no one cares that it's gone and never talked about again

chaostheory
7 replies
19h2m

Epic games has the potential to be the virtual Disney World - just available to everyone on the planet instead of those with enough money to visit a park IRL.

How? EPIC doesn’t have a VR platform at the moment.

The deal still makes sense though. Disney needs to control a video game platform.

ralusek
5 replies
18h50m

1.) Unreal Engine can be used in VR...

2.) Virtual worlds don't need to be VR

gamepsys
2 replies
18h41m

Unreal Engine isn't a VR platform, it's a tool that can be used to create a VR platform.

"The Platform" in this context is a position that allows you to collect ~30% fee of revenue generated. Unreal Engine's position is much much smaller. Using my definitions Epic gamestore technically counts as a VR platform, but isn't positioned to become market leader.

samplatt
1 replies
17h27m

You're correct but being overly pedantic. Not only is Unreal one of the biggest engines chosen for use with VR games but it's also one of the easiest and most effective for modders to retroactively inject the ability to use a game in VR.

chaostheory
0 replies
11h48m

Unreal is just an engine just like Valve’s source engine. It’s a tool for developers and it’s not a destination for consumers. I’m right in pointing out that you guys are confusing a game engine for a video game platform. They are two very different things, and I’m not being “overly pedantic”.

chaostheory
1 replies
18h34m

As someone else already mentioned, Unreal isn’t the Epic or Steam platform. SteamVR != Source engine

Virtual worlds don't need to be VR

Yes, but flat pancake games are even poorer at simulating a Disney theme park IRL than VR. It doesn’t even come close to a substitute, especially for the rides.

vineyardmike
0 replies
17h53m

You’re taking it too literally.

Virtual worlds as in a digital experience built around Disney’s cinematic universe. Like video games.

yazaddaruvala
0 replies
17h3m

Fortnite is playable in VR.

The "Fortnite creative engine" is roughly a Virtual Worlds editor / generator along side the Fortnite Virtual Worlds marketplace.

tapoxi
2 replies
19h45m

Disney has had access to it, there were a lot of Fortnite Avengers promotions. It obviously worked well enough for them to want to invest.

pests
1 replies
19h0m

I've expected a Fortnite movie for awhile now. The current storyline would be perfect for someone like J.J with his histroy of mistique.

Nit: It was all of Marvel not just Avengers and I think they did Star Wars too already.

matt_s
0 replies
2h5m

I've played fortnite on an off since there were seasons. I have no idea what the storyline is, there are some cut scenes when there is a new season but it make no sense. Claiming there is a storyline is a stretch, I think it is just cover for changing up the map/gear to keep it fresh.

rl3
1 replies
7h47m

Epic games has the potential to be the virtual Disney World ...

I miss Unreal and Unreal Tournament.

Draiken
0 replies
5h10m

This, so much.

Unfortunately all we get is content now. Even games have started to become pure daily content.

amelius
0 replies
8h17m

Both are doomed with the advent of generative AI.

chr-s
21 replies
19h50m

Disney use Unreal Engine for their dynamic greenscreen LED wall which they film The Mandalorian and others against. That's got to be at least as important as Fortnite characters.

tracerbulletx
8 replies
19h47m

Maybe but they've been wanting to get in to gaming for a while now, so this is probably mostly about that.

bitvoid
7 replies
19h21m

get back in to gaming

FTFY. They had their own game publishing arm since 1988, Disney Interactive Studios, and owned first-party studios like Avalanche Software, which was sold off to Warner Bros.

They shut it down in 2016.

er4hn
5 replies
19h19m

Don't forget Lucasfilm Games, nee LucasArts. They published a lot of games, both star wars properties and otherwise. They're now owned by Disney as well.

Apfel
2 replies
18h13m

Interesting to bring this up - always wondered which way the creative influence went between Monkey Island and Pirates of the Caribbean (if i recall correctly, the game is based off the ride, but the film was allegedly inspired by the game)

mauvia
0 replies
10h55m

I thought there was a book somewhere in the mix as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Stranger_Tides Wikipedia tells me the book inspired monkey island, the ride inspired both the book and monkey island, and the book inspired the fourth movie.

eep_social
0 replies
16h47m

I recall the first film opening with bars of a song which also features prominently in the ride.

Apparently the song itself was written for the rides in 1967 [1] and I assume is based off even older pirate shanties. Certainly reminds me of songs from the book Treasure Island (1883).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yo_Ho_(A_Pirate%27s_Life_for_M...

Sakos
1 replies
18h21m

Eh, Lucasflim Games was pretty much shutdown in 2013 and only stuck around as a shell just to license out to, uh, checks notes EA. They're nothing like what they used to be when they enabled games like Rogue Squadron, KotOR or Jedi Academy.

sailfast
0 replies
16h57m

Jedi Academy / KOTOR? Talk to me when you understand the wonder of Dark Forces and Outlaws. :)

Frotag
0 replies
18h45m

Toontown Online used to be a fairly popular mmo in the 2000s. The game itself is gone but the game engine was open sourced as Panda3d (C++ with Python bindings). The project is still active too, with modern features like PBR still being added. I personally like how it's code-first (vs editor-centric like Godot), but the GUI options are really fugly and clunky.

pnw
2 replies
19h8m

Epic doesn't charge for use of Unreal Engine in vfx, and overall I don't think vfx is a very profitable space for most software companies. It's a low margin business, mostly outsourced. I doubt that Hollywood studios are going to pay any vfx provider a share of revenue in any case.

set4
1 replies
19h2m
pnw
0 replies
17h23m

It's still not a significant source of revenue. How many per-seat licenses do you think they will sell to vfx companies, who usually operate on paper-thin margins?

ryukoposting
1 replies
6h1m

Yeah, I'm not sure why Disney of all companies would be so enamored by another company's entertainment IP that they'd spend $1.5B to have dibs on it. There has to be a better explanation than Fortnite skins.

krapp
0 replies
5h53m

Fortnite skins are probably worth more than Star Wars as a property at the moment. At least, worth far more than $1.5b.

empath-nirvana
1 replies
19h12m

Yeah that was my first thought. I'm sure the gaming part means something to them, but they probably think of them more as a Real Time Special Effects company.

TheMajor
0 replies
16h3m

100% this is it. Their virtual set and volume tech is unparalleled. Disney see it as the future of TV/film production.

MikusR
1 replies
19h40m

Only for the first season. They switched to their own stuff later. IIRC.

bhouston
0 replies
17h9m
maxglute
0 replies
6h21m

One would assume Pixar has enough talent to write something proprietary for Disney that integrates more of their VFX tech that UE can't do.

btown
0 replies
18h54m

I'm almost certain that the Unity licensing debacle caused a number of Disney department heads to say "we need to make sure this doesn't sneak up on us on the Unreal side for our cinematic production pipeline." Whether or not this deal was already in the works, it certainly didn't hurt it.

bhouston
0 replies
17h9m

That was true many years ago (that ILM used UE for the LED wall) but they switched out UE for a dedicated software tool by the second season of Mandalorian, called Helios.

Details here and elsewhere: https://www.engadget.com/the-mandalorian-season-two-stagecra...

gigatexal
20 replies
19h38m

Hilarious. A long time ally of Apple will invest in a company hell bent (and somewhat righteously so) knee capping Apple.

brokencode
10 replies
19h28m

Ally of Apple in what way? Do they give each other favorable deals or work closely together on any important projects? I haven’t heard of anything major along those lines.

I think an appearance of friendliness mainly came from Steve Jobs, and he’s been gone for a long time now.

fullshark
3 replies
19h12m

I don't think anyone answered sufficiently, the main thing was yeah Steve Jobs was on their board of directors and was the CEO of Pixar, but that runs deep even though Jobs died 12 years ago.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/09/bob-iger-remembers-s...

There was some analysis/chatter also that basically Disney's entire strategy the last 5-8 years also was to pump up its valuation as large as possible and then get acquired by Apple.

brokencode
2 replies
19h0m

I didn’t read the full article, but isn’t this describing mostly a personal friendship between Bob Iger and Steve Jobs?

I know that analysts have had recurring fantasies about Apple raining money on Disney, but has there been any real evidence of Apple considering that?

fullshark
1 replies
17h55m

Also says Iger was on Apple's board until 2019 when they started competing in streaming space.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/13/bob-iger-resigns-from-apple-...

Idk man, none of us had a drink at a bar with "Apple" and "Disney" to confirm the cozy relationship, others have provided business partnerships, what would satisfy you?

brokencode
0 replies
17h10m

I’m not the one out there trying to personify a friendship into two giant corporations. It’s a popular perception, but I just don’t see a lot of convincing evidence.

favorited
1 replies
19h25m

Bob Iger was literally on stage at the Apple Vision Pro announcement, demoing how they're bringing Disney+ to AVP.

brokencode
0 replies
19h5m

So what? Disney gets to push Disney+ at a huge, well covered event. Apple gets a big streaming app on release day for their new headset at a time when their relationship with Netflix and other companies is not great. That’s no indication of an “alliance”.

FinnKuhn
1 replies
19h24m

They seem to have cooperated in regards to bringing Disney+ to Apple Vision Pro unlike Netflix, who don't offer any kind of App.

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/01/apple-previews-new-en...

brokencode
0 replies
19h8m

Big deal, they made a Vision Pro app. They’re also still trying to grow Disney+ as quickly as possible in a very crowded market. They have a lot more motivation to try different things than Netflix, which is in a much more entrenched position.

solarkraft
0 replies
19h23m

They often appear in Apple keynotes, supporting new features on launch that other media services (Netflix, Spotify) won't.

gigatexal
0 replies
13h40m

Disney is basically a launch partner for the Vision Pro. They’re going to bring content to it to showcase its abilities iirc.

paxys
3 replies
19h35m

There are no friends in business. It is very common for large companies to be in close partnerships while also competing with or even suing each other.

Apple and Disney are themselves competitors in the streaming market.

pests
2 replies
18h57m

See also: Samsung and Apple competes in phones, yet Apple sources phone displays from Samsung

insane_dreamer
1 replies
12h31m

and used to source chips from Samsung too

ryukoposting
0 replies
5h55m

Does Apple make their own DRAM? If not, there's a good chance they still are sourcing chips from Samsung.

mcphage
3 replies
19h17m

Given how often there are lawsuits where a large company is on both sides of the aisle, I don't think this that crazy.

Macha
2 replies
19h9m

We very nearly had the same company on both sides when the MPAA (of which Sony Pictures was a member) was fighting with Sony Electronics over video tapes.

mcphage
0 replies
16h46m

Sorry, that’s what I meant: the same large company on both sides.

KerrAvon
0 replies
18h40m

Do you mean Betamax timeshifting? Sony didn't own a movie studio at that point. The entire reason they bought one was to prevent that sort of issue from ever happening again. Tail ended up wagging the dog, though.

m463
0 replies
8h26m

I wonder...

acquisition day 2: call off all lawsuits.

haunter
9 replies
20h25m

Epic does what Facebook couldn't. The Metaverse is real

I bet Zuck never ever played an actual video game in his whole life https://compote.slate.com/images/760b74a3-7156-4dbe-90bd-b02...

brucethemoose2
4 replies
20h23m

Also, game dev is hard. Engine dev is really hard.

There is a growing graveyard of games/devs suffering from bespoke engine woes instead of just using Unreal...

GuestHNUser
3 replies
19h51m

There is a growing graveyard of games/devs suffering from bespoke engine woes instead of just using Unreal...

Is there? I can't think of any examples that come to mind. Most indie devs I know that roll their own engine have no regrets. I am curious who comes to mind that says otherwise publicly?

spartanatreyu
0 replies
17h55m

In recent memory, the biggest two that come to mind:

- Halo Infinite's slipstream engine turned into spaghetti code due to 343's terrible employee cycling, most of the directors left around the same week, and now they're rehiring a brand new team made up of devs with Unreal Engine experience because the old engine would take too long to fix.

- The terrible console performance and engine woes of CD Project Red's Cyberpunk 2077 that almost led to the company being sued into hell led to them abandoning their own engine and switching to Unreal Engine for their next game.

nmfisher
0 replies
12h56m

Rolling your own engine seems to become troublesome when you're moving into AA territory (Cyberpunk/RED, FFXIV/Luminous, etc).

I guess at the low end (indies), you can design something lean that fits one specific use-case, and at the high-end (AAA) you really can afford to build/maintain something competitive. The middle-ground might be dangerous.

That being said, there are literally dozens of abandoned game engines out there from solo "game devs" who never actually got around to making the game.

brucethemoose2
0 replies
17h37m

Also, Mass Effect Andromeda.

Bethesda Game Studios is getting there.

I don't know about indie games as much, but I know Distant Worlds 2 got bit by its exotic engine.

Animats
3 replies
19h44m

Epic never did the metaverse. Sweeney talked about doing it, but they never shipped. Unreal Engine heavily preprocesses content in Unreal Editor, then trusts that content. For a metaverse, you need to do more of that server-side. Back when Sweeney was talking that up, I was expecting metaverse-in-a-box in Unreal Engine 7. That seems less and less likely.

The metaverse is real, and it's called Second Life. Which is a niche. It is a profitable niche. A "cash machine", one of the owners has said. So it stays around. Everybody else in the metaverse space lost money. Now that zero interest rates are over, and there's no more free money, this is even more true. Heavy Disney investment in a general-purpose metaverse seems unlikely. It doesn't fit their IP-based business model.

haunter
2 replies
19h4m

Epic never did the metaverse

Already exists and it's called Fortnite

pests
0 replies
18h47m

A bland corporate version maybe.

Animats
0 replies
18h46m

Fortnite's "creative mode" is a game level loader, not a metaverse. One creator makes a mini-game and uploads it, then others can visit. It's not a shared-world metaverse. Other game level loaders include Sinespace, Breakroom,and Sansar. Decentraland is in between - each user uploads their own parcel, but it's part of a shared world, where you can see multiple parcels at once.

In a real metaverse, you have neighbors. A very large number of people can each contribute to building a big world. Such systems are very rare.

That's not in line with Disney's business model. "The media giant will work with the Fortnite studio to create new games and an entertainment universe where consumers can “play, watch, shop and engage with content, characters and stories from Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, Avatar and more,” Disney said in a press release." Think of this as an expansion pack for the Marvel Overextended Universe.

paxys
8 replies
19h32m

Will be interesting to see what % stake Disney got. Tencent currently owns 40% of Epic and Sony has another 5%. Given their last valuation of $32B it doesn't seem like Disney will end up with more than 3-4%. Still a good chunk, but not quite enough to call the shots.

ProfessorLayton
3 replies
19h18m

Pretty sure Epic took a big haircut in valuation too, just like its peers. Money is a lot more expensive now, so perhaps Disney got a nice deal.

araes
1 replies
18h8m

Probably, they had to let 830 (16%) go to reach financial stability and got rid of Bandcamp and SuperAwesome for another 250. [1] Apparently they were "spending way more money than we earn" to try and turn Fortnite into a metaverse concept. However, lately they say they've been getting by on low margin creator content revenue sharing that seems to not be enough. Based on the letter, the layoffs and divestitures brought them to financial stability again.

[1] Sept 28, 2023 https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/news/layoffs-at-epic

jtriangle
0 replies
16h27m

Oh make no mistake, they're still burning a ton of money trying to get their cross play metaverse thing off the ground. Those dev teams didn't lose a single person in those layoffs, in fact, whole departments were gutted and some of the engineering talent was reassigned to the metaverse team.

It's so much worse than you can imagine.

quickthrower2
0 replies
17h2m

Disney ironically being the smartest tech investor by being old school and buying low.

zemo
2 replies
16h6m

yeah weirdly the Wikipedia page right now says it's 10% and its source is this article, which ... does not say that.

thaumasiotes
0 replies
15h9m

Wikipedia cares that claims are cited. It doesn't care whether the citation goes to anything that supports the claim.

SllX
0 replies
12h22m

That got removed. The math didn't math, and I assume the editors had no more luck than I did trying to independently verify it.

echelon
0 replies
19h29m

It's enough to start pivoting into this area. They can gain exposure and increase their stake over time.

bigiain
7 replies
19h42m

So is there a term like "acquihire" - except it means more like "we sold a stake in out company so we would get access to their legal department" instead of "we sold a stake in out company so we would get cushy jobs"?

BadHumans
6 replies
19h32m

Who needs whose legal department and why?

iamtheworstdev
5 replies
19h31m

Epic vs Apple just became Disney vs Apple

echelon
1 replies
19h27m

No it didn't.

Apple is trying to maintain its draconian grip over the app store because of the sweet revenue it brings. With worldwide regulatory pressure, that dam will eventually burst. But they'll keep it going as long as they can.

Apple is happy to engage in backroom deals. There's a future where Apple could acquire either or both of these companies.

willy_k
0 replies
16h24m

Apple is happy to engage in backroom deals. There's a future where Apple could acquire either or both of these companies.

Maybe they’d want to, but would regulators really let those mergers happen unless apple makes some big changes?

pests
0 replies
18h55m

Unless you have it backwards and now Apple uses its sway in Disney to get Epic to stop.

/s

empath-nirvana
0 replies
19h11m

No, that case is going to disappear now.

ArtificialAI
0 replies
19h5m

Disney boasts a diverse array of partnerships across various industries, and I believe that this specific collaboration won't adversely impact Disney's already formidable alliance with Apple. On the contrary, there's reason for enthusiasm regarding the possibility of Disney venturing into new territories where they haven't historically been prominent players. The prospect of Disney making substantial investments in these uncharted areas could lead to exciting developments and innovations, further strengthening their overall position in the market.

kmeisthax
6 replies
14h54m

Apple has a weirdly pro-Disney bias: watchOS has built-in Disney faces, on a watch where there's no custom watchface support whatsoever. And this is apparently mutual: Disney shipped a D+ visionOS app when several other streaming services (Netflix, YouTube, Spotify) were telling Apple to piss off.

Disney investing in the company that has been the biggest thorn in Apple's side is... interesting. Obviously, the immediate motivation is "we wanna jump on the Fortnite zoomer bandwagon", but I can't help but wonder if Tim Sweeney's days are numbered here.

justin66
2 replies
14h19m

I can't help but wonder if Tim Sweeney's days are numbered here.

He owns a controlling interest in the company.

runevault
1 replies
12h41m

Did he remain > 50% on this purchase? I dunno where the shares came from that Disney bought.

justin66
0 replies
12h33m

I assume he’s recently been awarded new shares and that new shares were created for Disney, such that everyone else was diluted. I’m not sure some of the figures being reported can be verified as accurate yet.

jaimie
0 replies
14h26m

There is a massive amount of history between the two companies, with Jobs being the largest individual shareholder of Disney due to the Pixar acquisition and Iger sitting on the board of Apple until Disney+ was launched.

There's a Wikipedia page dedicated to the subject with extensive references: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_acquisition_of_Disne...

hboon
0 replies
14h43m

Apple has a weirdly pro-Disney bias

Naturally since their CEOs were on the board of the other company and also Pixar.

SllX
0 replies
12h27m

Apple has an excellent relationship with Disney, but they're still two separate businesses with different interests that only align in some areas. Disney and Epic also have aligning interests.

That said, I would like to see how much equity Tim Sweeney still has left when all is said and done because as far as I know he only had 51.4% prior to today. A controlling share, sure, but somehow I doubt Disney gave him $1.5B for ~1.3%.

jwie
5 replies
6h38m

This has the same pattern as the Vivendi deal with Blizzard back in 2007.

In both instances, the game end of the deal had peaked already, and there was nowhere to go but down. Nothing a few billion dollars can’t fix, maybe some “new content,” says the business guys.

Meanwhile their product becomes worse by the month. The magic is fading. All the people who made it great move on, not wanting to deal with the business parasites who showed up to squeeze a buck. Repeat.

DecoPerson
4 replies
6h27m

Epic Games is not just games anymore.

Take a look at how The Mandalorian (a Disney production) was filmed. Epic Games’ software played a large part.

It goes beyond just film & television. They offer solutions for the automotive industry, aviation simulation industry, mining sims, trucking sims, medical sims, architecture, live broadcast, …

Hmm, I think I might invest if I can!

bombcar
2 replies
5h56m

At this point they should just buy Epic Healthcare and consolidate.

galangalalgol
1 replies
5h41m

I never expected a dystopian megacorp to start from a cartoon or videogame company. As a kid I figured it would kick off with walmart buying lockmart and just calling itself Mart.

lagniappe
0 replies
5h24m

Come come now, you know what would make you feel better? Let's open some loot crates.

ryanisnan
0 replies
1h38m

Bruce Miller is that you?

Animats
5 replies
19h54m

Wow! What will Disney do to Unreal Engine's pricing plan? Does Sweeney remain in charge?

Solvency
2 replies
19h46m

This will be a boon for Fortnite's licensed character business, Disney's merchandising business, Disney+'s content, and absolute downgrade/extortion for all Unreal users. Guaranteed.

nathants
0 replies
17h54m

this is why foss game engines are exploding right now.

jncfhnb
0 replies
19h27m

As an unreal user I am pretty damn confident it won’t affect anything

nickthegreek
0 replies
19h20m

Disney’s stake will not be big enough to give them that kind of voice.

justin66
0 replies
14h58m

Sweeney is certainly in charge. By all accounts he’s still got a controlling interest in the company.

Disney got themselves a board seat, one assumes, and some IP sharing.

A4ET8a8uTh0
5 replies
18h56m

Well now.. it is not like I need another reason to avoid Epic, but.. I am obviously not the target demographic here. I personally think, from Disney's perspective, this is not a wrong move to make.

Aeolun
4 replies
18h51m

I find the prospect of Disney characters shooting at each other with guns mildly disturbing.

A4ET8a8uTh0
1 replies
18h28m

That thought genuinely did not occur to me. That feature alone will pay 1.5b back within moments of becoming available.

jncfhnb
0 replies
18h21m

Been there for a long time already

spartanatreyu
0 replies
18h4m

Deadpool is a Disney character.

MattRix
0 replies
13h27m

better avoid the marvel movies and star wars then

rowanG077
4 replies
19h26m

No please no, god no. Disney rots everything it touches and epic games is more than rotten enough as it is.

ArtificialAI
3 replies
19h10m

Oversimplified negativity towards Disney and Epic Games doesn't capture their diverse contributions. A more nuanced view and consideration of both positives and negatives is advisable.

KerrAvon
1 replies
18h38m

Oversimplified positivity doesn't capture their perverse intentions. A more nuanced view of both negatives and positives is advisable.

ArtificialAI
0 replies
17h19m

Nuanced negativity fails to grasp their genuine intentions. A simplified perspective considering both negatives and positives is recommended.

georgeecollins
0 replies
16h41m

I agree that you can't make this that simple, you never know what will happen. But I have been in the game business as a developer/ publisher / whatever for decades and worked for Disney. Disney more then any other company I know of (maybe except EA) has squandered its opportunities and acquisitions in the game space consistently. Disney Interactive has died and been recreated I think three times in my career. If I started to make a list of all the game companies or game adjacent (Maker Studio) I probably would miss a bunch. And none of them worked. Disney has a really strong culture that has not in the past fit well with the video game business.

j2bax
4 replies
19h49m

I wonder if Apple has any regrets about its battle with Epic... Seems like they could have been a great launch partner for the Vision Pro...

al_borland
2 replies
19h36m

They aren’t the only game studio. If Apple rolled over on Epic, it would lead to their entire revenue model around the App Store falling apart.

jfoster
0 replies
16h28m

Also, Epic claim they were not willing to accept a deal that was just for them.

j2bax
0 replies
18h59m

Definitely not the only, but certainly the one most capable of building a scalable virtual world.

staplers
0 replies
19h30m

Apple, while being a hardware and (somewhat) software leader, has been in "let them eat cake" mode for quite some time.

Corporate leadership needs to start understanding that once they've saturated the market they need to loosen up or they're at risk of becoming a populist target.

BooneJS
4 replies
19h35m

Disney is diversifying. This comes on the heels of their subsidiary ESPN creating a new sports streaming service with Fox and Warner/Discovery (https://thewaltdisneycompany.com/espn-fox-warner-bros-discov...)

callalex
1 replies
18h16m

I wonder how long it will take them to morph into a financial services company.

xyclos
0 replies
17h58m

There's already Partner's FCU

https://www.partnersfcu.org/

CompYOUT
1 replies
14h9m

Disney is owned by the CCP this not diversifying. Its a great fit for EPIC and Disney to work together because of this. Let the protests begin!

loceng
0 replies
9h16m

How do you mean they're owned by the CCP?

sssilver
3 replies
12h48m

Every time something like this happens, it makes me really sad.

It means more of what we experience will have to adhere to more of the same rules, patterns, and decisions.

Uniformity is prevailing.

tzfld
0 replies
9h10m

And above that, we talk about Disney which represents almost every bad thing when talking about large corporations.

palisade
0 replies
7h21m

This would be true if it were a full takeover. But, actually it is just a small injection of cash. Which will greatly help the flagging Epic, which recently had to endure a relatively large layoff to stay the course. Disney is just making a cool metaverse with Epic that includes both their IPs; Star Wars / Avatar / Indiana Jones / etc and Fortnite, which is why they're providing this money. They were working on the technology together well before this investment. Epic isn't fully owned by Disney with this investment. Tencent has a much larger share.

UberFly
0 replies
9h49m

There's lots of independent, smaller entities out there, but yea, the grey goo of mainstream IP is always expanding.

Eji1700
3 replies
18h37m

That's probably the first thing i've heard about Epic Games that makes me think it'll still be around 5-10 years from now.

Disney can bring a LOT of content, so long as they can actually make it half decent content and not shit the bed like they did with EA.

jncfhnb
2 replies
18h31m

For me it was their billions of dollars of revenue

Eji1700
1 replies
17h17m

Yeah wasn’t clear that I meant the store.

Epic isn’t going anywhere

jncfhnb
0 replies
11h36m

The store is their means to distribute without a painful platform tax

Even if it’s just Fortnite its massively profitable to run it

nox101
2 replies
18h47m

Disney likes Apple, Epic hates Apple. Will this put a leash on Epic's push to break Apple's monopoly?

kevingadd
1 replies
18h45m

Disney probably wouldn't mind getting the kind of sweetheart deal Apple previously offered to Epic. 30% is a lot at their scale

jfoster
0 replies
16h27m

If Apple are giving sweetheart deals to anyone, Disney is almost certainly not paying 30% at the moment.

matt3210
2 replies
16h22m

What's Fortnite? -- 35 year old man

justin66
0 replies
15h40m

What’s Google?

Aerroon
0 replies
5h15m

It's a Battle Royale game with building. Third person shooter. 100 players are dropped off on an island, last one alive wins.

A circle is around the island that slowly becomes smaller. If you're out of the circle you take damage. This essentially speeds up the later parts of the game.

desireco42
2 replies
17h32m

Will they ruin whatever was good about Fortnite?

bigstrat2003
1 replies
14h37m

Since when is there something good about Fortnite for them to ruin?

NoPicklez
0 replies
13h45m

That's pretty rough, Fortnite has done some very cool things in gaming that have paid dividens

colkassad
2 replies
19h18m

I worked on a UT99 mod back in the day and was invited to the Raleigh office back in 2003 or so after our artist was hired by them. He still works there. Hard to believe how far the company has come.

gunapologist99
1 replies
17h19m

Still one of the greatest games of all time.

chupasaurus
0 replies
13h28m

That couldn't be bought other than physical copies if there are any left.

lapetitejort
1 replies
19h16m

Considering Square Enix's relationship with Epic, Disney's relationship with Square Enix, and now Disney's relationship with Epic, I expect Kingdom Hearts IV to be a tightly coupled collaboration.

SllX
0 replies
10h34m

That actually sounds like a nightmare.

Keep your Fortnite away from my Kingdom Hearts.

jprd
1 replies
19h43m

I think I'm going to need one of those Carrie Matheson / Pepe Silva full wall mind-maps to track all of this.

n4r9
0 replies
5h8m
joshspankit
1 replies
14h12m

Please no. Epic is one of the companies that needs to remain autonomous for the sake of technology and those who enjoy it.

tristan957
0 replies
13h49m

According to other people in the thread, 40% of the company is owned by Tencent already.

askafriend
1 replies
19h9m

What do we think the valuation is? Do we think it's down, flat or up?

I'd hazard a guess at flat. Unity (a peer) got crushed by the market but they also don't have Fortnite which is a money printer and has only gotten bigger.

Ekaros
0 replies
6h38m

Unreal have much more reasonable revenue model. And it is not going anywhere. Unity on other hand shot their own foot off with model they presented.

ajhurliman
1 replies
13h35m

Oh wow, the collaboration that exactly zero people wanted to see

judge2020
0 replies
13h27m

I doubt Disney would invest this much if the purchase data (and cash flow) didn’t support this decision.

Thoreandan
1 replies
19h2m

So... Jill of the Jungle and Eva Earlong are now officially Disney Princesses.

acheron
0 replies
17h37m

Town of ZZT animated movie when?

SLHamlet
1 replies
18h23m

It's the mass market on-ramp the Metaverse needs.

https://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2024/02/disney-epic-interoperable-...

Roblox should start sweating. Then again, so should anyone who's created Disney-themed fan content on Rec Room, VRChat, etc.

maerF0x0
0 replies
15h39m

IDK if I agree. Disney wants to sell you a mickey tshirt on every platform so you have to buy N of them.

Ekaros
1 replies
9h47m

I didn't know that Disney was in place where they had resources to invest anywhere...

okokwhatever
0 replies
6h58m

How do they get funded? To me this is a great question (and also "why?")

xgkickt
0 replies
15h22m

I imagine this would allow Disney some control over user-generated content heavily influenced by or outright infringing on their properties?

wyldfire
0 replies
19h28m

Sounds like horizontal integration.

thedougd
0 replies
15h23m

Now Epic can unpause their HQ build. It hasn’t been going anywhere since they were hit with 9 figure fines.

slimebot80
0 replies
12h44m

Well Musk will be furious

sharken
0 replies
11h12m

Admittedly old news, but Disney is now joining Lego and Sony with regards to investments in Epic Games.

https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/news/sony-and-kirkbi-in...

sebastianconcpt
0 replies
5h19m

It's going to go in one direction. Down.

Also monocrhomaticaly violet and with mandatory genderconfusionist characters.

scotty79
0 replies
12h29m

Will someone at some point break Disney apart or will this tumor only grow forever?

schappim
0 replies
17h7m

Disney investing $1.5 billion in Epic signals that Disney thinks it can repair the Epic-Apple relationship.

riow
0 replies
3h26m

Elon is not going to like this LOL

okokwhatever
0 replies
7h2m

How does Disney funds all the failures? I cant understand it... it's like if the money never stops with some companies even losing money (or earning every year less and less). Weird.

mminer237
0 replies
20h51m

This is like a 3–4% stake then?

iancmceachern
0 replies
12h12m

I bet they'll combine this, their new VR treadmill thing, and their parks into a VR Epic Games experience

honkycat
0 replies
16h34m

seems like a good call.

I realize this is from a ground level but: The games getting made by the Unreal Engine today are of such high quality and graphic fidelity.

They've really hit critical mass for the AA and AAA games, and paying the piper is looking like a smarter and smarter investment.

Do film companies write their own editing software, or 3d pipelines, or design and build their own cameras? Some of them, sure. But most of them are purchasing and customizing off-the-shelf solutions. It just makes sense.

hnthrowaway0328
0 replies
18h25m

What about Unity then?

dev1ycan
0 replies
6h33m

People talk a lot about tencent buying a stake in epic but they basically are hands free and let epic go down the rabit hole of fighting apple in court and getting into financial troubles because of it.

Same thing with tencent letting Grinding gear games basically make poe 2 which is huge financial risk when they already had a succesful game that could have kept going, just for the sake of making it better for their players over time.

Disney however? yeah, now people will actually see what unrestricted capitalism does to a company, I really hope this is mostly just aimed at the fact that Disney probably uses unreal engine and doesn't want it going down, but the cynic in me thinks that disney as a corporation will try to squeeze as much as they can out of their money.

bonestamp2
0 replies
11h20m

Wow. I noticed a lot of Star Wars content in Rocket League showed up today... and I thought Epic was paying Disney. I guess it's the other way around.

berserk1010
0 replies
19h51m

I wonder if Tencent still owns 40% of epic games, or did they sell some of that equity to Disney. Either way Tencent probably still got diluted, and Tim Sweeney should still have majority control

barbazoo
0 replies
16h17m

Mega-mega corp!!!

bangonkeyboard
0 replies
19h30m

What's surprising to me is that this deal is apparently about content and IP, not the Unreal Engine technology per se.

O1111OOO
0 replies
19h2m

I've come across a few articles in the last year and they all seem to agree that Sports and Gaming is where the money is because the fan base is so... passionate.

It makes sense that on the heels of Disney's collaboration with FOX and Warner Bros. Discovery (via ESPN), they would also get into the other market with fans as committed as sports fans.

Considering that the future of TV is streaming and being successful in this market has proven to be no slam dunk (no matter how big you are), Sports/Gaming is the hedge (for those who can swings these deals).

LarsDu88
0 replies
12h54m

This is a pretty astute move.

Unreal tech powers EVERYTHING at Disney now ever since the development of virtual production leveraging real-time rendering.

On top of the that the Fortnite demographic is growing up and videogame based IP moves are making bank (Sonic, Mario, Last of Us).

If the cogs are turning in Bob Iger's head, it's that videogame IPs are the next Marvel/Star Wars.

DaleNeumann
0 replies
20m

This puts Disney in the same board table with Tencent and Sony.